Saint Joseph Catholic Church

The Archdiocese of Kaduna, Nigeria, called on federal and state governments to rescue the Catholic and other Christian worshippers who were kidnapped in Ariko on Easter Sunday.

“The attack in Ariko left five worshippers dead, and about 35 others abducted,” said Father Christian Okewu Emmanuel, the archdiocesan chancellor, according to an Abuja-based newspaper.

“Our hearts are heavy as families grieve the loss of loved ones while others remain in captivity,” he added. “We appeal to the authorities to do all in their power to ensure their safe return.”

Archbishop Timothy Broglio of the Archdiocese for the Military Services, USA, welcomed the two-week ceasefire in the Iran war but expressed regret that Lebanon was not included.

The prelate said in an interview with EWTN News that “I’m happy that at least the two sides are talking to each other and perhaps looking for a solution to avoid any sort of armed conflict and perhaps pull back on the tensions in the area.”

“It would be helpful that any sort of peace dialogue involve all of the participants and all of those who might be either belligerents or victims of any sort of military action,” he said. Dialogue, he added, “should have taken place before any sort of military action was taking place.”

A truck driver rammed into an Easter Sunday procession in Mariamabad, Pakistan, killing a teenager and injuring more than 60 people.

The suspect, Muhammad Bilal, remains at large.

In a wide-ranging interview with Dialoghi, a periodical published by the Italian Catholic Action movement, Cardinal Pietro Parolin lamented the drift from diplomacy to force in international relations.

“I am struck by how much determination—I was about to say ease—the war option is presented as decisive, almost inevitable, bending international law to one’s liking,” the Secretary of State of His Holiness said. “The awareness of the value of peace, the awareness of the tragic nature of war, the awareness of the importance of shared rules and of respecting them seems to have disappeared.”

Cardinal Parolin also discussed the European Union, the United Nations, China, Venezuela, and Greenland, as well as the contribution that Christians can make to public life: by their support of “human life and dignity, of religious freedom, of the proposal of correctives to the current economic-financial system in accordance with the principles of the social doctrine of the Church, of the protection of creation.”

Asked about the Trump administration’s professed support of Christian values, Cardinal Parolin said:

We cannot say that we love and defend life and be concerned only with that of the unborn without considering that life is also that of migrants who die at sea, of women and children who have nothing to eat, of peoples devastated by the weapons we produce and sell ... At the same time, those who are concerned about saving whales but justify the silent killing of huge numbers of human beings in the womb fall into the same contradiction.

The Maronite parish priest in Rmaish (Rmeich), a Lebanese village on the Israeli border, discussed the plight of Christians there amid the Lebanon war.

“Just this morning, the Apostolic Nuncio, Archbishop Paolo Borgia, asked us how we are and what our needs are,” Father Toni Elias said on April 8. “These days, I am compiling a list of medicines. There are people with cancer or undergoing serious treatments. Some need very specific or very expensive medicines, which cost a lot or are no longer available.”

“We need these essential goods, and above all, a humanitarian corridor,” he added.

The cardinal archbishop of Tehran-Ispahan, Iran, wrote an Easter message to his flock, a month after his evacuation to Rome.

“I find myself far from you, the flock entrusted to me, separated by the events of war, waiting to be able to see you again,” said Cardinal Dominique Mathieu, O.F.M. Conv. “In the communion of saints and in the grace of the sacraments, especially in the Eucharist, we are truly united, even when we cannot be so visibly.”

The Latin-rite Archdiocese of Tehran-Ispahan has four parishes and 3,500 Catholics, according to the Annuario Pontificio.

commentary

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Alleluia Verse, Ps 118:24:This is the day the LORD has made; let us be glad and rejoice in it.

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